PAKISTAN FLAG in a CRICKET STADIUM


Ace Pakistani International Cricketer Mohammad Yousuf today has said that he is not happy with the amount of International exposure given to the Pakistan cricket national side. Importantly, after Australia has terminated their tour to Pakistan, Pakistan will end up this year by playing not even a single test.

Yousuf, who has represented Pakistan in 269 ODIs and in 79 Tests, has expressed his concern over the current situation with the Pakistan cricket. He is not only disappointed, but feels that such situation has never had with any international cricket side.

The last blow to the cricket loving country was of course when the ICC decided to pull out the Champions Trophy from Pakistan that was scheduled to play here from 12th September 2008.

Yousuf also expressed his concern over the fact that lack of Test Cricket will actually decrease the ability to play strong and skillful cricket among the current Pakistan players. In this craze of T20 cricket, the real test is of course the Test Cricket and even that stops then it will be really a blow to the Pakistan Cricket.

T20 cricket is the new structure of the cricket, which was initially introduced in United Kingdom for inter- county professional competition by Wales and England Cricket board in the year 2003. Both the teams have single innings and bat for maximum of 20 overs.

The twenty20 cricket game is completed in approximately two and the half hour with the every innings that lasts near around in 75 minutes, therefore bringing sport closer to span of time of the other famous team games such as football or hockey. This game was introduced for creating the lively structure of sport that would be very pretty to the spectators at ground and viewers on TV and also it is very successful.

The sport is spread around the cricketing fraternity around the world. Inaugural world cup, an international level event for T 20 cricket was played in the year 2007 in South Africa and India was the first T 20 cricket world champions.

History of T 20 cricket

While idea of the short format of sport was discussed in the year 1998 and year 2001, but 20-20 cricket was not officially introduced till year 2003 when ECB launched twenty20 cricket cup in the attempt to restrain the declining attendances to the matches of the County Cricket. First authorized Twenty20 cricket matches were played in the year 2003 on 13th June between the varieties of the English counties. Initial season of the Twenty-20 cricket in the country England was the considerable success with Surrey Lions defeating Warwick shire Bears with the 9 wickets remaining in the hands in final to take cup of the Twenty20 cricket.

In the year 2008, on 1st February the Twenty20 cricket match among Australia and India in the Cricket Ground of Melbourne was sold on the sales of the pre- tickets and 84,041 citizens attended cricket match involving Twenty20 cricket champions of the World against one day international World Champions.

The International Cricket Council appoints the worldwide referees and the umpires, which is sponsored by the Emirates Airline, which officiates at entire sanctioned 5 day matches, Twenty20 cricket matches and ODIs. The International Cricket Council operates the three panels of the Umpires: significantly Affiliates and the Associates Panel, Elite Panel and International Panel. International Cricket Council is worldwide governing body of the cricket. International Cricket Council was founded as Imperial Cricket Conference in the year 1909 with the representatives from the Australia, South Africa and England renaming it in the year 1965 as the International Cricket Conference and taking up its recent name in the year 1989.

Indian Premier League is recently the most popular and the largest 20-20 cricket league in the entire World. The Indian Premier league is also called as the DLF Indian premier League and also is abbreviated as IPL. It is the Twenty20 competition of the cricket which is formed by Board of the Control for the Cricket in India. Indian premier league first session commenced on the April 18, 2008 and concluded on June 1st 2008 with Rajasthan Royals defeating the Chennai Super kings in final at DY Patil stadium in Navi Mumbai.

Members
Internationally, T 20 cricket is played since year 2005. Till date sixteen countries have played the T 20 cricket. The 16 countries are:
• Australia
• West Indies
• Bangladesh
• India
• Kenya
• Netherlands
• England
• Pakistan
• Sri Lanka
• New Zealand
• Canada
• Bermuda
• South Africa
• Zimbabwe
• Scotland’s
• Ireland

It was tough call for ICC to postpone the Champions Trophy, but they did not have many options with them.

With the pulling of South Africa, and fear of joining the protest by Aussies, New Zealand and England, ICC has postponed the Champions trophy scheduled in September in Pakistan to October, the venue is still the same. The venue is the major issues, as some of the leading teams do not want to tour Pakistan due to some security issues.

David Morgan, the ICC president expressed his support to the Pakistan Cricket Board in this grim time.

The main reason for the concern of these four visiting countries is that, since last few months, the Pakistan is fighting heavily with Al Qaeda and Taliban on its northwestern region dominated by tribal people. There are more than 1000 death till now due to the fighting.

The main reason for the postponement of the event was due to lack of any concrete decision regarding the venue of the game. So to get some extra lead time, ICC finally called for the postponement of the Champions Trophy

It was a very tough call for the ICC as it has great divide within itself on the issue of the venue for the Champions trophy and it is on verge on split.

The PCB has advocated that it has successfully organized Asia cup few months back and this withdrawal will cause millions of dollars loss to it, which right at this moment PCB can’t afford.

The coming few days will be very crucial for every one, as ICC will be under immense pressure form some of the powerful Asian countries for not changing the venue where has it has to deal with opposing countries.

Yes this is true news, the ICC is on verge of split, and the main reason for these unfortunate circumstances is the current Venue for the Champions trophy. Recently South Africa has pulled back from the ICC champion’s trophy due to the security concern over the venue in Pakistan.

Australia, New Zealand and England have already said that they are not going to participate in the tournament if the venue of the Champions trophy is not changed from Pakistan to some where else.

There are very high chances that the Venue for the Champions trophy is moved from Pakistan to Sri Lanka.

IF this happens and four strong member nation of ICC does not participate in the tournament then we can see a probable collapse in the entire championship and costing millions of dollars loss to ESPN-STAR.

One more concern looming regarding the change of venue, if this is demand is accepted this time, them we might see the same demand being asked during the time of world cup in 2011 going to be held in India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka.

One of the reasons for aggravation of the crisis is because the mighty India, which is the controlling authority of the ICC wants to teach lesson to the players who does not want to tour Pakistan, just they want to prove their mettle in the game.

But for the betterment of the game, people should sit and decide the best way to settle the dispute. Because if there is partition in the ICC, then the only cricket will be the worst affected.